


Unlearn, Relearn

by smallashes



Series: Artefacts [2]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Gen, M/M, One Shot, post-plantation, post-reunion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-25 21:00:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14985479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smallashes/pseuds/smallashes
Summary: "Perhaps to be too practical is madness. To surrender dreams — this may be madness. Too much sanity may be madness — and maddest of all: to see life as it is, and not as it should be!”― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don QuixoteThomas feels the weight of his time in Bedlam seeping back into his psyche.





	Unlearn, Relearn

The pile of leaflets and pamphlets on Thomas’ desk grows by the day, lies upon lies that England hides beneath the written word they claim as truth. He started his collection eagerly, each morning as he fetched a new loaf of bread from the baker’s, wanting to refamiliarize himself with civilization, with politics and the world. They seem to taunt him now, in that pile he refuses to destroy, as reminders of what had been taken from him, the power that he had lost.

 _Civilization_ as he knew it fell apart in Bedlam, in Georgia – he realizes he doesn’t miss the security of his nobility, not the wealth nor the respect, but the power he had held in a position he desperately wished would sustain him in his goals. There were moments in Bedlam where madness felt less a diagnosis and more an answer, that perhaps slipping away into the agony of it all was the most logical next step. And the newest pamphlet, outlining the successes of the colonies, stares at him, indignant. There was a time where he, too, saw truth in these lies, and to think he believed the New World to be a gift; his head swims in a cacophony of emotions, conducted by guilt and anger, and madness once again feels like a solution, an escape. Could he slip away to forget?

Gone are the days when he could challenge and influence those where it mattered, even if the words he once spoke weigh of ignorance and naïveté to him now. The scars on his arms he hides under his sleeves remind him of more, nagging at the back of his mind. _You were more than ignorant and naïve; your intentions were good, but your understanding more sinister._ He had learned in the error in his ways, though only through the loss of everything, damned to see the world through the darkness.

Madness, suddenly, seems a tempting escape.

Thomas places the pamphlet on the top of the pile, more gingerly than he understands himself. He sits at his desk with a pen in hand, loose sheets of blank paper scattered next to the neatly-placed pile of pamphlets, and he struggles to form thoughts concrete enough to be put down. He glances at the pile again with a deep-seated sense of injustice from their words that he cannot fully verbalize and he drops his pen and leaves his desk, angered at his confusion, at a mind he knows was once so capable in its prowess.

“Where do I begin?” he asks himself aloud, settling himself in front of a humble hearth.

James, who sits adjacent with a book in hand, peers over the pages with concern. “If you’re asking about supper, I was going to offer to get us a chicken.”

Thomas couldn’t help but laugh – an exasperated, slightly frustrated laugh that James so often pried out of him, in a way only James ever could.

James closes his book and leans forward, speaking more seriously this time: “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know,” he replies, before shaking his head. “No, I do know. But it’s a complicated thing, James. Is it wrong for me to yearn for the days when I was a lord? Before they branded me mad?”

“I suppose that depends entirely on why you miss being a lord.” James reaches for his hand, laces their fingers together. “Someone who knows you less than I might think you miss the wealth of it all, but I know you and I know you don’t care for image.”

 “It’s the idea of it, I suppose,” says Thomas, a bitter smile tugging at his lips. “I once held the power to influence, to sway those who could maneuver the ranks of Parliament, but my knowledge was incomplete. And now that I’ve grown wise to the ways of the world, I’ve been stripped of that privilege; for who would listen to a madman?”

“You aren’t mad, Thomas.”

“Aren’t I? At least, in the eyes of society at hand?” He looks to James, eyes pleading. “Those pamphlets I’ve been collecting, they serve as reminder, James. That despite my best intentions I failed to use my time wisely, that I can only sit here powerless while England continues to mar the face of truth.” He pauses, scrambling to string together his thoughts. “I want to _do_ something, anything.” _I am helpless._

†

That night is spent in James’ arms, who lay in bed behind him, arms wrapped around Thomas’ torso as he gives small, lazy kisses onto his shoulder. Thomas, mind still restless, clouded, wants sleep to come, want peace. But sleep befalls him not; only a slurry of emotion and abstract thoughts occupy the space of his mind, begging to be deciphered, organized, and realized.

James, it seems, sense his unease. He lifts his head, places it onto Thomas’ shoulder, and wraps his arms tighter around him. “Tell me how I can help you,” he mutters. “Share your burden with me so you’ll not be alone.”

“I appreciate the sentiment. Truly, I do,” Thomas replies, deeply guilty despite it all. “But I’m afraid you can’t reach into my mind and make sense of what I feel any more than I can currently.” Thomas turns onto his back, with James above him. He cups James’ jaw, runs his thumb across his auburn beard.

James leans down, their noses touching, lips brushing as he speaks; “I’m willing to try.”

†

In the morning, it is James who fetches their bread and returns with a new pamphlet, a fresh inkwell, and a clean, newly-bound journal. He places the inkwell and journal onto Thomas’ desk, who eyes the pamphlet in James’ hand. “Today’s is boring,” says James with a sly grin and a glint in his eye. “And I thought you’d want something a little less scattered to write on.”

Thomas opens the journal to the first page, but his eyes linger on James’ face, who furls his eyebrows together in concern, searching for approval. “Words came so easily to me once,” Thomas mutters, the thought bitter on his tongue. “I feel I am overwhelmed – perhaps reality was never meant to be experienced through the mind of a sane man.”

James kneels next to him, one arm on the desk and the other in Thomas’ lap. _How handsome_ , Thomas thinks. _Your hair’s grown long again, and the scars and creases suit you. I could almost pretend nothing had happened._ “You may no longer have a salon with an audience of pompous, self-righteous nobles,” says James. “But I do not doubt your capabilities. And if _you_ doubt them, then I will always be here. Take your time, work things through with me; just as we’d done years ago.”

“I don’t need to convince you of anything, James. Your experience transcends mine, even.”

James takes Thomas’ head in his hands. “Then _write_ – you certainly didn’t do enough of it in London.” He flashes Thomas the same joking grin, though he knows his intentions are true. “Talk to me, to sort things through, then write them down. You needn’t try to make sense of the world all on your own.”

Thomas rests his forehead against James’, eyes closed. He nods, trying to internalize his situation, to allow it to settle into his conscious mind. “And if what I write sounds mad?”

“They called you insane to hide the truth, to silence you. You aren’t insane, Thomas.” James hands him his pen and opens the new inkwell before rising to his feet. He kisses Thomas on the crown of his head. “You’re the most brilliant man I know.”

Thomas glances at the pile of pamphlets, knowing there is truth to be liberated from its words. Even if England were to see him as a madman, truths are universal, independent of its speakers. He simply had to find it. He may have no salon for discussion, but James is worth them all combined and more; there isn’t a single man in the world he trusts more to be his partner in pulling the truth back into the light. He sighs and puts down his pen as his stomach growls for food. “Shall we discuss this over breakfast?” he asks, taking James’ hand.

James pulls him to his feet, wraps his arms around his torso, and leans up to Thomas. “Of course,” he says with a grin. “The salons always _did_ feel like they’d be improved on with food.”

**Author's Note:**

> Lord Thomas Hamilton, sir, I love you but you're so much harder to write than your husband.
> 
> So uh I just finished an entire class on madness and desire in literature and that _may_ have influenced how I interpreted the whole truth/madness theme we get in Black Sails....
> 
> Also the people on this show talk in _paragraphs_ , god damn.


End file.
